Caucasus campaign
Caucasus campaign | |
---|---|
Part of the Armenian Highlands, South Caucasus | |
Result | See aftermath |
Territorial changes | Independence of Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia |
1914–1917:
Russian Empire
1917–1918:
Transcaucasian DFR
1918:
Armenia
United Kingdom
Centrocaspian Dictatorship
Baku Commune
1917:
Russian Provisional Government
Russian Republic
Russian SFSR
Pontic Greeks
1918:
Azerbaijan
1918:
Germany
Georgia
Northern Caucasus
Armenian Army
British Armoured Car Expeditionary Force
Dunsterforce
:
1914: 160,000[2]
1916: 702,000[2]
On 1916: 445 battalions, 159 squadrons and 12,000 Kurds[5]
1918: 3,000
200+[8]
5,000
300,000-405,733[9]
83,083 killed
170,000 died of disease[10]
113,570 wounded
39,080 captured
Civilian casualties: 523,000-2,500,000 killed[12]
The Caucasus campaign comprised armed conflicts between the
The Russian military campaign started on 1 November 1914 with the Russian invasion of Turkish Armenia.[13]
In February 1917, the Russian advance was halted following the
On March 3, 1918, the campaign had terminated between the Ottoman Empire and Russia with the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, and on June 4, 1918, the Ottomans signed the Treaty of Batum with Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia gaining independence. However, conflict continued as the Ottoman Empire was still engaged with the Central Caspian Dictatorship, the Republic of Mountainous Armenia, and the Dunsterforce of the British Empire until the Armistice of Mudros was signed on October 30, 1918.
The Turkish genocide of the Armenians began in April 1915 when 250 Armenians were arrested. The official reason was that the Armenians were in league with the Russians and could serve as a potential fifth column.[14] The genocide continued until 1923.
Background
The main objective of the Ottoman Empire was the recovery of territory in the
Russia viewed the Caucasus front as secondary to the
The British worked with Russian revolutionary troops to prevent Enver Pasha's goal of establishing an independent Transcaucasia. The
Forces
Ottoman Empire
The Ottomans had one army based in the region, the 3rd Army. In 1916 they sent reinforcements and formed the 2nd Army. At the beginning of the conflict, the combined forces of the Ottomans ranged from 100,000 to 190,000 men. At the beginning of 1916, the Turks sent huge reinforcements to the Caucasus consisting of troops who had previously won the Gallipoli campaign, their total number was 445 battalions, 159 squadrons, as well as about 12,000 Kurds[20] Many were poorly equipped.
Russia
Before the war, Russia had the
Armenia
In the summer of 1914,
The
In December 1917, the
By the beginning of 1918, the Armenian National Army (made up of 17,000 former troops of the Russian army augmented by 4,000 local volunteers) numbered some 20,000 infantry and 1,000 cavalry, and according to Allen and Muratoff, on 1 January 1918, the Armenian Corps had:
- 2 infantry divisions:
- 4 regiments (3 battalions in a regiment)
- 3 infantry brigades:
- 4 battalions in a brigade
- one cavalry brigade:
- 2 regiments:
- 4 squadrons in a regiment
- 2 regiments:
- some militia battalions
- 6 artillery batteries:
- 4 guns in a battery
(N.B. the battalions fluctuated in strength from 400 to 600 men.)[24]
Contrary to initial Turkish opinion, the Armenian force was actually rather well-equipped and trained. The infantry were made up of veteran soldiers of the Druzhiny units which had fought alongside the Russians for almost four years, and they were allowed to—and did—recover the best of the equipment left behind by the decaying Russian Army. Alternative estimates given by the Ottoman Army state that the Armenian army numbered 50,000 men by the beginning of 1918, while post-war Russian sources put Armenia's strength as two veteran rifle divisions, three brigades of volunteers, and one brigade of cavalry.[25]
Others
Lionel Dunsterville was appointed in 1917 to lead an Allied force of under 1,000 Australian, British, Canadian and New Zealand troops, accompanied by armored cars.
-
1914,Russian Caucasus Armyat Sarikamish
-
1914, Staff ofArmen Garo
-
1914, Ottoman 3rd Army with winter gear
-
1915, Troops of Kurdish cavalry
Operations
1914
On November 1, in the
During December,
From all countries Armenians are hurrying to enter the ranks of the glorious Russian Army, with their blood to serve the victory of the Russian Army... Let the Russian flag wave freely over the Dardanelles and the Bosporus, Let your will the peoples [Armenian] remaining under the Turkish yoke receive freedom. Let the Armenian people of Turkey who have suffered for the faith of Christ receive resurrection for a new free life...[28]
— Nicholas II of Russia
On December 15, 1914, at the Battle of Ardahan, the city was captured by the Turks. This was an operation commanded by the German Lt. Col. Stange. The mission of Stange Bey Detachment was to conduct highly visible operations to distract and pin down Russian units. Stange Bey's initial mission was to operate in the Chorok region. The unit was materially assisted by the rebellious Adjars of the country, who seized the road. Later Enver modified the original plan toward supporting the Battle of Sarikamish.[29] Stange Bey Detachment was ordered to cut the Russian support link to Sarikamish-Kars line. On January 1, this unit was in Ardahan.
On December 22, at the Battle of Sarikamish, the 3rd Army received the order to advance towards Kars. In the face of the 3rd Army's advance, Governor Vorontsov planned to pull the Russian Caucasus Army back to Kars. Yudenich ignored Vorontsov's wish to withdraw. He stayed to defend Sarikamis. Enver Pasha assumed personal command of the 3rd Army and ordered it into battle against the Russian troops.
1915
On January 6, the 3rd Army headquarters found itself under fire. Hafiz Hakki Pasha ordered a total retreat. On January 7, the remaining forces began their march towards Erzurum. The resulting Battle of Sarikamish became a stunning defeat. Only 10% of the Army managed to retreat back to its starting position. The entire IX Corps surrendered to the Russians. By mid-January less than 18000 of the 95000 Turks who fought the campaign survived. 30000 are said to have died of cold. The mean elevation of the district was 6500 feet above sea level and the Turkish army was supplied by a single railway and snowbound roads.[30]
After this, Enver gave up command. The Armenian volunteer units were definitely a factor in their defeat, as they challenged the Ottoman operations during critical times,[31] and his experience may have been one of the catalysts that led the Three Pashas, of which one was Enver, to their decision to conduct the Armenian genocide only a few months later.[32] After his return to Constantinople, Enver blamed this defeat on Armenians living in the region actively siding with the Russians.[33]
On January 18, 1915, the Lt. Col. Stange's Turkish unit was recalled from the area around Ardahan. It was to stay behind the lines in the region; only on March 1, 1915, did it regain its initial position.
In February, General Yudenich was praised for the victory and promoted to commander-in-chief of all Russian troops in the Caucasus. The Allies (British and France) asked Russia to relieve the pressure on the Western front. In return, Russia asked the Allies to relieve pressure in the Caucasus by a naval attack. The resulting operations
During March the strategic situation remained stable. The completely devastated 3rd Army received new blood through reinforcements from the 1st and 2nd Armies, although these supplements were not stronger than a division. The Battle of Gallipoli was draining every Ottoman resource. Meanwhile, the Russians were holding the towns of Eleşkirt, Ağrı and Doğubeyazıt in the south. Military action never escalated above small-scale skirmishes—the Ottomans simply did not have enough forces to secure the whole East Anatolian region.
On April 20, the resistance at the city of Van began. The Armenian defenders were protecting 30,000 residents and 15,000 refugees with 1,500 able bodied riflemen who were supplied with 300 rifles and 1,000 pistols and antique weapons. The conflict lasted more than three weeks until General Yudenich's force came to rescue them. General Yudenich began an offensive (May 6) moving into Ottoman territory. One wing of this offensive headed towards Lake Van to relieve the Armenian residents of Van. A brigade of Trans-Baikal Cossacks under General Trukhin, and some Armenian volunteers advanced towards Van.[34]
On April 24, Interior minister
On May 6, the Russian advance began through the Tortum Valley towards Erzurum. The Ottoman 29th and 30th Divisions managed to stop this assault. The Ottoman X Corps counter-attacked the Russian forces. But on the southern part of this advance, Ottoman forces were not as successful as they have been in the north. On May 11 the town of
On May 27, during the Russian offensive, the interior minister of Talat Pasha ordered a forced deportation of all Armenians out of region with the
By June 13, Russian units were back to their starting line. On June 19, the Russians launched another offensive; this time northwest of Lake Van. The Russians, under Oganovski, launched an attack into the hills west of Manzikert. The Russians underestimated the size of the Ottoman army, and were surprised by a large Turkish force which counterattacked. Russian forces began to march from Manzikert towards Mush. However, they were not aware of the fact that the Turkish IX Corps, together with the 17th and 28th Divisions was moving to Mush as well. Although the conditions were extremely difficult, the Turks were executing a very efficient reorganization. 1st and 5th Expeditionary Forces were positioned to the south of the Russian offensive force and a "Right Wing Group" was established under the command of Brigadier General Abdülkerim Paşa. This group was independent from the Third Army and Abdülkerim Paşa was directly reporting to Enver Paşa. The Turks were ready to face the Russian attacks.
On September 24, Grand Duke Nicholas was promoted to being in charge of all Russian forces in the Caucasus. In reality, he was removed from being Supreme Commander of the Russian Caucasus Army which was the highest executive position [actual conduct of the war] for the Caucasus campaign. His replacement was General Yudenich. This front was quiet from October till the end of the year. Yudenich used this period to reorganize. Around the start of 1916, Russian forces reached a level of 200,000 men and 380 pieces of artillery. On the other side the situation was very different; the Ottoman High Command failed to make up the losses during this period. The war in Gallipoli was sucking all the resources and manpower. The IX, X and XI Corps could not be reinforced and in addition to that the 1st and 5th Expeditionary Forces were deployed to Mesopotamia. Enver Pasha, after not achieving his ambitions or recognizing the dire situation on other fronts, decided that the region was of secondary importance. As of January 1916, Ottoman forces were 126,000 men, with only 50,539 being combatants. There were 74,057 rifles, 77 machine guns, and 180 pieces of artillery. The Ottoman force in the Caucasus campaign was large on paper, but not on the ground. The Ottomans assumed that the Russians would not bother to attack. This assumption turned out to be false.
1916
In early January, Yudenich secretly left his winter quarters and marched towards the major Ottoman fort at Erzurum. The winter is not normally a time for military activity in this part of the world. The bitter cold and terrible roads contributed greatly to the annihilation of Enver Pasha's 3rd Army in the previous year. The Russian General Yudenich viewed this as an opportunity to take the Ottomans by surprise. The Russians achieved total surprise and destroyed an Ottoman division that was in winter quarters in the Battle of Koprukoy (January 10–18).[citation needed]
On February 16, Mahmut Kamil was forced to order the 3rd Army to retreat from the city, as Yudenich had a numerical advantage over the Ottoman army. The difference was not big enough to be decisive, so Yudenich's plan was to attack the center of the Ottoman defenses, with the key attack falling in a weakly held sector. While diversionary attacks held the attention of Mahmut Kamil near the Deve-Boyun ridge, Russian forces broke through at Forts Kara-gobek and Tafet.[36] The result was that both rings of the cities' defenses had been penetrated.[citation needed]
In April, the Caucasus army moved in two directions from Erzurum. Part went north and captured the ancient port city of Trabzon. The other part moved in the direction of Mush and Bitlis .These units pushed the 2nd Army deep into Anatolia and defeated the Turks in the Battles of Mush and Bitlis (March 2 – August 24), driving the Ottoman army before it. Bitlis was the last defence point for the Ottoman Army to prevent the Russians from moving into central Anatolia and Mesopotamia.[citation needed]
During July, General Yudenich then countered the Ottoman attack with an offensive of his own towards Erzincan. This was the Battle of Erzincan (July 2–25). On July 2, Erzincan was captured. The Ottoman offensive against Trabzon was halted as they tried to stabilize their front lines to prevent the Russians from entering Anatolia and Mesopotamia.[citation needed]
After their defeat, the Ottoman Army gave
By late September, the Ottoman attack ended. The cost for the 2nd Army was 30,000 killed and wounded. The Russians strengthened their lines. They were strong enough to respond with counteroffensives two weeks after the launch of the Ottoman offensive. The Russians held up the advance.
From September to the Russian Revolution, the Russian Navy still dominated the Black Sea.
The rest of the year 1916 was spent by the Turks making organizational and operational changes in the Caucasian front. Fortunately for the Ottoman commanders, the Russians were quiet during this period. The winter of 1916–17 was extremely harsh, which made fighting nearly impossible.
1917
The military situation did not change during the spring of 1917. The Russian plans for a renewed attack never substantiated. Meanwhile, Russia was in political and social turmoil. It was also influencing the army ranks. The chaos caused by the
Until the Russian Revolution of 1917, the Ottoman Empire's possible operation in Caucasia could not be imagined. After the Battle of Sarikamish, the Ottoman units were "almost always" in a disastrous situation trying to hold onto regions in the occupied Ottoman lands. The Ottoman forces could not take advantage of the chaotic situation during 1917, as their units were not in good shape. Enver moved five divisions out of the region because of the pressure from the British in Palestine and Mesopotamia.
On March 1, the order "Number–1" published by Petrograd Soviet of Workers’ and Soldiers’ Deputies included paragraphs envisioning democratization of the army. This written command enabled military units to elect their representatives. On March 9, 1917,
During the summer, during the
- 1st brigade:
- 2nd brigade:
- 3rd brigade:
On September 14, 1917, the Russian army in the region, which was about to completely disintegrate, lost commanding authority, and the tendency of the villagers for plundering had increased. Towards the end of autumn, the Chief General of the Caucasus Front Przhevalskii had already ordered the establishment of national Armenian and Georgian forces within the Army to slow down the disintegration. The problems of demobilization of Russian Army (on all fronts Russians had the same problems) would in a way bring the end of the Russian government and help the Bolsheviks to come into power easily. In November 1917, the first government of the independent Transcaucasia was created in Tbilisi as the "Transcaucasian Commissariat (
The Transcaucasian Sejm was headed by a Georgian Menshevik, Nikolay Chkheidze. However, the Transcaucasian Sejm failed to stop the degradation of forces in the region into smaller national forces. While Armenians sent representatives to the Transcaucasian Sejm, at the same time the Eastern Armenian leaders at Yerevan tried to established an Armenian Army Corps. Armenians had planned to keep their existence based on a political strategy of being supportive of the Allies and Russia and to establish their national army with Russian support.[24] General Nazarbekov was selected as Commanding Officer.
- 1st Division commander General Christophor Araratov was assigned by Yerevan:
- 1st Erzurum and Erzinjan regiment,
- 2nd Khnus regiment,
- 3rd Yerevan regiment,
- 4th Erzinjan and Yerevan regiments.
- 2nd Division's commander Colonel Movses Silikyan was also assigned by Erivan:
- 5th Van regiment,
- 6th Yerevan regiment,
- 7th and 8th Alexandropol regiments.
The Chief of Staff of the Armenian Corps was General Vickinski. The divisions, which comprised four regiments each, also had three regular and one depot regiment. Their total strength was 32,000 enlisted men. Besides these regular structures able men were also armed. A 40 to 50,000-strong force formed from this armed civilian population. In Baku alone, the Russian army left 160 cannons, 180 machine guns, and 160 million cartridges to the Armenians.[citation needed]
On October 23, during the October Revolution, the Ottoman Third Army was protecting the 190 km area from the Munzur Mountains to the Black Sea with 66 battalions consisting of 30,000 combatants, 177 machine guns, and 157 cannons. The number of machine guns, animals, supply, transportation and clothing were all problematic. Russia had strengthened Erzurum and Trabzon. Russia had 9; the Ottomans had 3 planes. The Russian forces were in a line from the west of Trabzon, along the Erzincan-Kemah passage, passing through south of Tunceli and Murat waters to Lake Van and to Baskale. On this line, the Russian army against the Third Army had 86,000 combatants and 146 cannons. The situation was a stalemate.[38]
On December 5, 1917, the armistice of Erzincan (Erzincan Cease-fire Agreement) was signed by the Russians and Ottomans in Erzincan. It ended the fighting between Russia and the Ottoman Empire.[39] Between December and February 7 the regiments of the Armenian Corps were immediately hustled off to the front. They created a spectacle en route, for, to the amazement of the homeward-bound Russian soldiers, they were moving toward, not away from, the forward lines. Russian soldiers left equipment and guns to the newly constructed Armenian national army. After the nationalization (or "democratization" in some sources) of these left over forces throughout 1917, there was no effective Russian military force in the region by the end of 1917 .
At the turn of 1918, the Allied Powers, the Cossacks in the south, the Georgians, the Pontic Greeks, and the Armenians were willing to build a resistance line against the Ottomans through gathering in the region. In case of an agreement between Russia and the Ottoman Empire, this was the only strategy to continue fighting against the Ottomans.[40] The Armenians that kept their position in the region after the withdrawal of the Russian soldiers from the Caucasian front had taken support of 1 million rubles from Britain.[41]
1918
The Bolshevik revolution left Russia's vast southern territories unguarded, except for a few thousand Armenian volunteers equipped with castoff Russian arms, commanded by Tovmas Nazarbekian and an even smaller force of refugees from western Anatolia led by Andranik Ozanian, spread along a line extending from Yerevan to Van and Erzinjan.[42] On 2 February, Turkish forces launched an attack at the disintegrated Caucasus front that was abandoned by Russian Troops. Having defeated the scattered and poorly-organized Georgian and Armenian units, Ottoman forces quickly recovered the territories that were lost previously to Imperial Russia in 1915-17, The Ottomans invaded the former Russian possessions in the Caucasus and the Secession of the Region from Russia.[43] The Third Army's offense headed by Vehib Pasha began on February 5. The Ottoman forces moved through east of the line between Tirebolu and Bitlis and took Kelkit on February 7, Erzincan on February 13, Bayburt on February 19, Tercan on February 22, and the Black Sea port of Trabzon on February 24. The incoming sea-borne reinforcements began to disenbark at Trabzon. Manzikert, Hınıs, Oltu, Köprüköy and Tortum followed over the following two weeks. By March 24 the Ottoman forces were crossing the 1914 frontier into what had been Russian Empire territory.[42]
On March 3, the Grand vizier Talat Pasha signed the
A
On 14 April, the Ottomans with 10,000-12,000 troops[47] captured the port of Batumi and its garrison of 3,000 troops after two days of light fighting.[48] On April 23, 1918, the Ottomans laid siege to the fortress city of Kars, now under the effective control of Armenian and non-Bolshevik Russian troops. The fortress had been strengthened considerably by the Russians since its capture in 1877, and the garrison was strong and well-stocked. The garrison numbered some 10,000 men, and they had at their disposal 154 fixed artillery pieces, 67 reserve artillery pieces, 46 fortress machine guns, 20 reserve machine guns, and 11,000 rifles.[49]
Transcaucasian Democratic Federative Republic foreign minister Akaki Chkhenkeli had previously ordered the city to surrender at first contact with the Ottomans, doing so without the notice of the Armenian members of his coalition government; while not followed, the order threw the defenders into confusion and partly caused the exodus of thousands of civilians before and during the siege. Independent of this, it was clear to all involved that the Armenians, surrounded, outnumbered, and cut off from relief, could not hold the city indefinitely. As a result, the garrison scrambled for a way to negotiate their way out without having to fight for the city. The Ottomans agreed to let the garrison peacefully exit the city, but only if they would surrender the entire fortress and its armory intact. General Nazarbekov, the Armenian Corps Commander based in Yerevan acting through a French intermediary, agreed to the surrender of the city and its garrison on April 25, 1918. At the same time the batteries surrounding the city were occupied and in the evening a regiment from the Ottoman I Caucasian Corps entered into the city and took it under control. The Ottomans obtained 11,000 rifles, 2 million bullets, 67 cannons, and 19 machine guns from the surrender.[50]
On May 11, a new peace conference opened at Batum,
On June 4, the
In June, German troops arrived to compete with the Ottomans for Caucasian influence and resources, notably the oilfields at Baku.[52] Early in June, the Ottoman army under Vehip Pasha renewed its offensive on the main road to Tiflis, where they confronted a joint German-Georgian force. On June 10, the 3rd Army attacked and took many prisoners, leading to an official threat from Berlin to withdraw all of its troops and support for the Ottoman Empire. The Ottoman government had to concede to German pressure and to halt, for the moment, a further advance into Georgia, reorienting its strategic direction towards Azerbaijan and Iran.[53] A Georgian delegation composed of Chkhenkeli, Zurab Avalishvili, and Niko Nikoladze went to Berlin to negotiate a treaty — which was aborted by the German collapse in November.
Enver Pasha had created a new force in March, named the
In October, Ottoman troops pursued General Andranik's Armenian forces into mountainous Karabagh and Zangezur. The conflict was fierce, but indecisive. The
Casualties
Russian casualties are hard to estimate. There were 50,000 irrecoverable losses in the period of June–September 1916 alone, mostly from non-combat causes.[6] The Ottomans took 15,728 Russian soldiers prisoner up until the collapse of the Russian Empire: 9,216 in the Caucasus and 6,512 in Romania.[55]
Ottoman casualties are clearer. Using records from the Ottoman Archives, American historian Edward J. Erickson estimated Ottoman losses in this campaign by battle or phase. Not including non-combat deaths and injuries or non-critical wounds, Ottoman battle casualties were:[56]
- Northeastern Frontiers 1914: 11,223 (1,983 Killed in Action (KIA), 6,170 Wounded in Action (WIA), 3,070 Prisoner of War (POW)
- Sarikamis 1915: 40,000 (23,000 KIA, 10,000 WIA, 7,000 MIA)
- Tortum/Van/Malazgirt 1915: 58,000 (19,000 KIA, 38,000 WIA)
- Eliskirt Valley 1915: 10,000 (4,000 KIA, 6,000 WIA)
- Koprukoy 1916: 15,000 (4,000 KIA, 6,000 WIA, 5,000 POW)
- Erzurum 1916: 15,000 (4,000 KIA, 6,000 WIA, 5,000 POW)
- Trabazon/Lazistan: 9,000 (3,000 KIA, 6,000 WIA)
- Bayburt/Erzincan 1916: 34,000 (5,600 KIA, 13,400 WIA, 17,000 POW)
- 2nd Army Offensive 1916: 30,000 (10,000 KIA, 20,000 WIA)
- Armenia/Azerbaijan 1918: 4,500 (1,500 KIA, 3,000 WIA)
- Prisoners of war (unassigned): 9,010
This gives a total of 235,733 casualties (83,083 killed, 113,570 critically wounded, 39,080 prisoners). Disease deaths (including deaths from the cold) overwhelmingly outnumbered combat deaths for Ottoman forces however, with over twice as many Ottoman troops dying of disease in the war than in combat. Assuming the same for the Caucasus, Ottoman disease deaths would number ~ 170,000, and total deaths would number ~253,000. Additionally, total woundings were x2.5 greater than critical ones overall. If this average also held true in the Caucasus, total wounded would number 284,000.[57] Altogether, total Ottoman losses would be around 576,000 (284,000 dead, 253,000 wounded, 39,000 prisoners), over a third of total Ottoman casualties in World War I.[original research?]
Historian Uğur Ümit Üngör, the author of Confiscation and Destruction: The Young Turk Seizure of Armenian Property, said many atrocities were carried out against the local Turks and Kurds by the Russian army and its Armenian volunteer units.[58] A large part of the local Muslim Turks and Kurds fled west after the Russian invasion of 1916.[59]
Armenian genocide
During the Caucasus campaign,
Aftermath
The Ottoman Empire lost World War I to the Allies, but the borders in the Caucasus were not settled. Two years after the armistice, a peace treaty was signed between the Allied and Associated Powers and Ottoman Empire at Sèvres on August 10, 1920. The Ottomans Empire during the Caucasus Campaign were able to successfully halt the Russian invasion into Eastern Anatolia and led a successful counter-offensive against the Russians forcing them to withdraw. With the subsequent Russian Civil War this allowed for the Ottoman's (Islamic Army of the Caucasus) led by Enver Pasha to advance deep into South Caucasus causing the dissolution of the Transcaucasian DFR in which the Islamic Army of the Caucasus had reached the Caspian Sea and won a decisive victory at Battle of Baku effectively ending the war.[62][63]
Territorial disputes
After the war, The
Sovietization of Caucasus
On April 27, 1920, the government of the Azerbaijan Democratic Republic (ADR) received a notice that the Soviet army was about to cross the northern border and invade the ADR. In the west, there was a war over Karbakh with Armenia; in the east, the local Azeri communists were rebelling against the government; and to the north the Russian Red Army was steadily moving southward having defeated Denikin's White Russian forces. ADR officially surrendered to the Soviets, but many generals and local Azeri militias kept resisting the advance of the Soviet forces and it took a while for the Soviets to stabilize the newly proclaimed Azerbaijan Soviet Socialist Republic. On December 4, 1920, the government of the First Republic of Armenia effectively surrendered. On December 5, the Armenian Revolutionary Committee (Revkom) made up of mostly Armenians from mountainous Karabakh entered Yerevan. On December 6, Felix Dzerzhinsky's dreaded secret police, Cheka entered the city, thus effectively ending all existence of the First Republic of Armenia.[64] The Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic was proclaimed, under the leadership of Aleksandr Miasnikyan. On February 25, 1921, the Soviet destruction of the Democratic Republic of Georgia happened.
On October 23, 1921, the end of hostilities came with the
See also
- Persian campaign
- Armenian genocide
- Black Sea naval campaign of World War I
- Sykes–Picot Agreement
- Russo-Turkish Wars
Footnotes
- ^ Sönmez, Orhan. Kuzey Kafkas Direnişi, Kafkas İslam Ordusu ve hazin son
- ^ ISBN 0-521-62096-1.
- ISBN 978-0-415-77099-6.
- ^ Eugene Rogan. The Fall of the Ottomans The Great War in the Middle East (англ.). — Basic Books, 2015. — 460 p. — ISBN 978-0-465-02307-3
- ^ Олейников А. Россия-щит Антанты. С предисловием Николая Старикова.-СПб.:Питер, 2016.-336 с.-( серия «Николай Стариков рекомендует прочитать») ISBN 978-5-496-01795-4
- ^ a b Allen, W. E. D.; Muratoff, Paul (1999). Caucasian Battlefields: A History of Wars on the Turco-Caucasian Border, 1828–1921. Nashville: Battery Press. p. 439. "Losses" for the Caucasus Army for June–September 1916 are given as 50,000, including Baratov's, which were mostly from sickness.
- Erzurum Offensive (21,000+), and Battle of Erzincan(~17,000).
- ^ "Statistics of the Military Effort of the British Empire" (London: HMSO, 1920). Page 778. Note: British Indian Army only. Details for British Indian Army personnel in Dunsterforce: unknown officers, 158 other ranks, and 23 followers dead from all causes. Unknown followers and officers and 15 other ranks wounded.
- ^ Allen, W. E. D.; Muratoff, Paul (1999). Caucasian Battlefields: A History of Wars on the Turco-Caucasian Border, 1828–1921. Nashville: Battery Press. p. 439. Includes losses from sickness and desertion.
- ^ Erickson 2001, p. 241
- ^ Erickson 2001, p. 241
- ^ Hüdavendigar Onur: Milleti Sadıkadan Hayk’ın Çocuklarına, İstanbul, 1999, s.126.
- ^ Ath, Altay (2003). "Caucasus". Turkey in the First World War. Retrieved November 10, 2022.
- ^ "Holocaust and Genocide studies: Armenia". University of Minnesota. Retrieved November 10, 2022.
- ^ ISBN 0-86307-181-3.
- ^ Pollard, A. F. (1920). "The first winter of the war". A Short History of the Great War. London: Methuen.
- ^ a b c The Encyclopedia Americana. Vol. 28. 1920. p. 403.
- ISBN 1-84511-142-7.
- ^ Hovannisian, R. G. (1967). Armenia on the Road to Independence, 1918. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press. p. 59.
- ^ Олейников 2016, p. 177.
- ISBN 3-11-169459-3.
- ISBN 0-306-70760-8.
- Paris Peace Conference, 1919through a letter to French Foreign Office – December 3, 1918
- ^ ISBN 0-89839-296-9.
- ^ Erickson 2001, p. 182–183
- ^ "First World War.com – Feature Articles – Who Declared War and When". firstworldwar.com. Retrieved June 17, 2016.
- ISBN 0-313-31516-7.
- ISBN 0-521-21280-4.
- ISBN 0-8153-0399-8.
- ISBN 0-7126-6645-1.
- ^ "the delay enabled the Russian Caucasus Army to concentrate sufficient force around Sarikamish"
- Pasdermadjian, Garegin; Aram Torossian (1918). Why Armenia Should be Free: Armenia's Role in the Present War. Hairenik. p. 22.
- ISBN 0-06-019840-0.
- ^ a b Hinterhoff, Eugene. Persia: The Stepping Stone To India. Marshall Cavendish Illustrated Encyclopedia of World War I, vol iv. pp. 1153–1157.
- ^ Safrastian, A. S. (January 1916). "Narrative of Van 1915". Journal Ararat. London.
- ISBN 0-89839-296-9.
- ISBN 0-7139-0135-7.
- ISBN 975-521-400-3.
- ISBN 0-521-26310-7.
- ISBN 1-86064-117-2.
- ISBN 975-428-290-0.
- ^ a b Erickson 2001, p. 183
- ISBN 978-9941-8-3424-0.
- ISBN 1-4039-6422-X.
- ^ ISBN 0-521-21280-4.
- ^ ISBN 1-4039-6422-X.
- ^ Erickson 2001, p. 184
- ^ Marshall, Alex. "The Caucasus Under Soviet Rule". p. 89.
- ^ Erickson 2001, p. 185
- ^ Richard G. Hovannisian. The Republic of Armenia: The first year, 1918–1919. Page 27.
- ISBN 0-8143-2604-8.
- ISBN 0-87395-265-0.
- ^ Erickson 2001, p. 187
- ISBN 0-312-10370-0.
- ^ Arslan, Nebahat Oran: Birinci Dünya Savaşı’nda Türkiye’de Rus Savaş Esirleri [Russian Prisoners of War in Turkey During World War One], Istanbul 2008, pp. 112–113
- ^ Erickson 2001, pp. 239–240
- ^ Erickson 2001, p. 241
- ISBN 978-0-19-968605-6.
- ISBN 978-0-19-150554-6.
- Armenian Genocide Museum-Institute.
- ISBN 978-0-19-533402-9.
- ^ Snowden, Jack (December 6, 2018). "The Ottoman 'Islamic Army of the Caucasus' in Dagestan (1918) | War History Online". warhistoryonline. Retrieved January 24, 2024.
- ISBN 978-0-312-10370-5.
- ISBN 0-226-33228-4.
- ^ a b "Text of the Treaty of Kars" (in Russian). Archived from the original on April 24, 2007.
- ^ a b "English translation of the Treaty of Kars". Archived from the original on January 27, 2001. Retrieved July 28, 2007.
References
- Falls, Cyril (1960). The Great War pp. 158–160. (covers 1915 fighting)
- Fromkin, David (1989). A Peace to End All Peace, pp. 351–355. Avon Books. (covers 1918 operations)
- Harutyunian, The 1918 Turkish aggression in Transcaucasus, Yerevan, 1985. (covers conquest of Armenia, 1918)
- Head, Michael, S. J. (2016). "The Caspian Campaign, Part I: First Phase – 1918". Warship International. LIII (1): 69–81. ISSN 0043-0374.)
{{cite journal}}
: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link - Pollard, A. F. (1920). A Short History of the Great War (chapter 10). (covers 1916 fighting)
- Strachan, Hew(2003). The First World War, pp. 109–112. Viking (Published by the Penguin Group) (1914 operations)
- Ulrichson, Kristian Coates (2014). The First World War in the Middle East (Hurst, London) (The Caucacus Campaigns, Chapter 3 pp53–74)
- Russian Campaign in Turkey
- Олейников, Алексей (2016). Россия-щит Антанты. С предисловием Николая Старикова. St. Petersburg: Питер. ISBN 978-5-496-01795-4.